CAN THE ‘THANK-YOU SCROLL’ SAVE OSCAR SPEECHES?
When Patricia Arquette accepted her best-supportingactress award for Boyhood at 2015’s Oscars, she unfolded a piece of paper at the microphone and thanked the academy, her film distributor, the producers, the cast and crew, her favorite painter and the people behind GiveLove.org, who provide ecological sanitation in the developing world. Among others.
Then Arquette kicked it into gear with a passionate speech about wage equality for women that brought the audience, and Meryl Streep, to their feet in wild applause.
“Patricia had something profound to say, but when she brought out that piece of paper and started listing names, you just went ‘No!’ ” says Pete Hammond, awards columnist for Deadline.com. “It wasn’t the names she read, it was those words about wage fairness that really had the passion to make it a great Oscar moment.”
This year’s Oscar producers, David Hill and Reginald Hudlin, believe the telecast’s new “thank- you scroll” can help achieve such moments.
Viewers tuning in to Sunday’s 88th Academy Awards (ABC, 7 p.m. ET/4 PT) will find a scroll of names rolling across the bottom of the screen — listing people whom winners have preordained to thank when they step to the podium. See it as a ticker tape of gratitude.
The producers unveiled the concept earlier this month at the annual Oscars Nominees Luncheon, urging winners to give heartfelt speeches within the allotted 45 seconds rather than reading off those names.
The publicists, the agents, the sanitation websites.
Hill and Hudlin were particularly struck by Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry’s name-filled speech last year for best documentary short Crisis Hotline. As the walk-off music started, Perry added that her teenage son had committed suicide and urged dialogue.
“That started us thinking, how can we ensure that the winners have an opportunity to say what’s in their hearts and thank the most important people at the same time?” Hill says.
Hollywood’s biggest stars have had similar struggles. Jennifer Connelly never looked up from her paper when accepting the supporting-actress Oscar in 2002 for A Beautiful Mind.
Ben Affleck spun his thank-you wheels against the clock taking best picture for Argo in 2013.
Hilary Swank brought out a crumpled piece of paper during her best-actress speech for Boys
Don’t Cry in 2000, “because I knew I couldn’t forget anyone.”
After thanking the studio, acting coach, casting directors and her publicist (“I’m almost done, I promise”), she forgot to thank her tearful husband, Chad Lowe, in the audience.
Will the scroll ease the burden and bring life to Oscar moments? Steve Pond, awards editor for the industry website TheWrap.com, is dubious. “I doubt it’s going to have the intended effect,” Pond says. “When people are up there, they’re still going to want to thank people out loud that they thanked already on the scroll.”
Hammond hopes it will lead to more memorable speeches, even if he worries that the scroll might actually distract viewers. “Oddly enough, it could take away attention from a great speech by encouraging a great speech,” Hammond says.
“But when I heard about this idea, I thought, ‘No one has ever tried this.’ We’ll just have to see if it works.”